Dies Irae

May 24, 2019

I started work on A New Book of Old Hymns over a decade ago, typing up each hymn in cumbersome OpusTeX format. Much of the tedious typing was accomplished on my father’s old Atari Portfolio. Also, I have never formally studied Latin - I am pretty much self-taught, and I keep learning, but at the time I was typing up hymns that I wasn’t altogether familiar with in a language I largely didn’t understand. Typos were rife, as you might expect.

So, I wasn’t too surprised to find a typo in Dies Irae - we sing this one at little pet funerals in our backyard. Requiem Aeternam seems out of place for their little material souls. The general memento mori tone of this Medieval Sequence seems about right. Plus, it’s an awesome piece.

The trouble is, updating the OpusTeX files, getting them to compile, plus the drop cap font is temperamental to work with too.

Then there’s updating all the online copies of the book! Six editions through Lulu, plus one through Amazon. The Selz widget is easy enough to update, though I’m thinking about moving over to Gumroad.